you're gone (and i am too)
by sleepyaugustus
Summary: Bellamy's got an arrow through his gut and Clarke is absolutely losing it. :: major character death warning. prompt from rachel!


**you're gone (and i am too)**

**PROMPT: "**_I need hurt Bellamy (canon verse would be great) and I need some Octavia/Clarke interaction. Any sort of context would be great idc either way._**" -somethingmorecreative1 (tumblr)**

**warnings: major character death and feelings**

* * *

She hopes with every individual cell in her body that she can fix this.

But she's not as sure as she needs to be. Bellamy's breathing is already rapid, his chest is heaving and sweat pours from his skin in buckets. His cheeks are flushed red and his eyes are wide.

"Clarke," he gasps "Clarke…"

She hushes him as gently as she can, praying that her indifferent façade is competent enough to keep him from glimpsing his fate in her tormented eyes. "It's going to be alright, Bellamy. Just keep breathing for me, okay?"

He manages a weak nod, settling his head into the pile of sheets that serves as his pillow for all intents and purposes. Clarke bites her lip, forcing her hands to quit trembling as she studies the arrow erupting from his stomach.

It's an awful sight. Clarke wants to close her eyes and pretend it's not real, that she can't feel his warm blood seeping through the fabric of his shirt and staining her hands. She wants to curl up in the corner of the dropship and sleep until it all goes away. Until this reality is nothing but a sick nightmare.

But she can't. She's the only one who can save him, and she'll do just that or she'll damn well go down fighting. Clarke would do anything to keep Bellamy alive.

Because she needs him. He's her partner, co-leader, _friend_. He's important and she _really fucking needs him_. Bellamy may be a pain in her ass and a threat to her sanity, but he's all she has left.

She scrambles her mind for all that she knows about arrow wounds. But she doesn't have time for this, he is dying and she can't remember what to do because she's _scared_, God dammit, and that excuse just isn't good enough when his life is on the line.

His eyes are unfocused and, from the dazed look sitting on his face, she guesses that his vision is going in and out. Before she absolutely loses it, (because, _Christ_, she's about to) there's a commotion outside the dropship's doorway. Heavy footsteps on the ramp and muffled voices arguing. She wants to yell for them to stop distracting her, that she's trying to concentrate, that Bellamy is _dying_ and she's a lost breath away from going off her rocker… But she does none of these things because Octavia is the one who emerges in a burst of daylight through the now wide open door.

She steps in determined, her expression hard. But as soon as she catches sight of her brother, a weak hand flits up to cover her mouth in horror. "Bell?" she squeaks, and her feet stagger to his bedside. "Oh my God…_Bellamy_."

His name on her lips does something; his eyes flicker open for a fraction of a second and his lips twitch. "O," he sighs painfully. "You shouldn't be in here-"

"What the hell happened!" she interrupts with a break in her voice, and Clarke swears she sees fire in the younger girl's eyes. "You went _hunting_. You were getting _food_. How did this _happen_?"

He tries to placate her, but it's weak. He's weak. Clarke can't waste anymore time.

"Octavia," Clarke warns seriously. "Help or get out. He's not in good shape."

Her hard demeanor shatters and her eyes are welling up. "What do we do?" she whispers hoarsely, staring at the offending piece of rock on wood that is sucking the life from her only brother. Clarke feels Octavia's pain in the pit of her stomach, because it's her pain, too.

"Anything we can," is Clarke's answer, and for now, it's enough. She doesn't want to think about when it won't be.

They work together; Octavia holds him still while Clarke attempts to remove the arrow without nicking anything important. It's tedious and her hands ache from the careful movements, but she's focused now. There's hope with Octavia here—she'd never let Clarke kill her brother.

"Shh," she hears Octavia hush Bellamy's whimpers. "It's okay, Bell. It's almost out, I swear."

His face is scrunched in pain, and Clarke wants nothing more than to take all of his suffering away. He's acting strong, forcing the close-to-intolerable pain out of sight with just his will; he's doing it for his sister and possibly for Clarke, too. Selfless in his last moments, she almost loses her calm at the realization that she might lose someone this valuable. Bellamy could _die_.

She won't let him.

She wants morphine, sterile tools, _more experience_. But she has none of these things. His face is becoming more pale by the second and there is blood _everywhere_. On the floor, on his clothes, on her hands.

When she finally manages to remove the arrow, Bellamy has passed out — whether from pain or blood loss, Clarke doesn't know. But she's not sure if she wants to, anyway. Seeing him like this is almost as torturous as watching the exodus ship burst into sparks of light before her eyes, thinking that her only blood relative had been aboard.

Octavia is drained, Clarke can tell. She has watched her older brother fight for his life in the middle of a crumbling dropship stationed on Earth, and Clarke wouldn't wish that on her worst enemy. Only because she is living this same nightmare. Bellamy means something to her and she's out of her mind trying to fix this.

For now, he is stable, and Clarke sets about finding something that can slow the bleeding around her messy, uneven stitching—she hadn't been able to get her hands to stop shaking. She digs through boxes and materials for supplies because what limited gauze she has left will do nothing to help him; the wound is too large.

Octavia helps. They scurry around in search for fabric, paper, blankets — anything. They're on the third level when Clarke realizes she can use the sheets of Bellamy's makeshift pillow as a bandage, at least until they find something better. She wants to smack herself for her ignorance but she blames it on the lack of reliability in her mind at this moment. Coming this close to losing the only other person in this camp she's been able to relate to has taken to knocking her head around.

But he's going to be alright, she knows. There's no way he couldn't make it out — he's Bellamy for Christ's sake; he doesn't just _give up_.

When she was young, little feet tapping against the metal floors of the ark and her tiny fingers smudged against the thick glass viewing windows of Phoenix, her mother would always tell her a single piece of knowledge about her work.

"_You can lose your patient in a blink of an eye. So don't blink._"

Bellamy is too pale when she descends from the latter; Octavia hot on her heels. She flings herself toward the boy on the table and his wide pupils meet hers; the fear in them is so potent Clarke feels something cold pierce her lungs. His skin is cool and his breathing is shallow. She can barely hear him speak when he says her name. "_Clarke_."

Eyes pricking, she rips the sheets out from under his head none too gently, because he's in shock right now and there are more important matters than a bump on his head. "I swear to God, Bellamy," she mutters with a shaky voice. "If you die, I'll never forgive you."

It's selfish and entirely not within the limits of "good bedside manner" but Clarke isn't a doctor right now — she's a scared girl fighting for her friend's life. And Bellamy isn't playing the part.

He cannot die. The camp won't survive. Octavia won't survive.

Clarke doesn't know what will become of her, but she knows it isn't anymore pleasant than the rest.

Octavia's screaming at Clarke to do something, to fix him, to _bring him back_. "What are you doing!" She screeches. "Fucking move over!" And it's then that Clarke realizes Bellamy has stopped breathing.

A choke strangles Clarke's throat as Octavia pushes her from the table. She only watches on when his sister begins pumping his chest and breathing air into his mouth. "_Wake up, Bellamy_," she growls, but the heat isn't felt because there are wet tears and snot tracking down the girl's face that disagree with the bite in her words.

"Aren't you going to do something?!" She yells now, whipping around to Clarke. "Anything! Are you even going to _try _to save him? _Clarke_!"

Her shocked stupor cracks a moment long enough for her to take in the situation. Bellamy's skin is ghostly, his eyes are closed and lips parted. She could believe he was sleeping had his body not been so still, absent of his usual rolling movements of breath.

Stepping forward, Clarke places two fingers under the crook of his jaw, feeling for a beat that isn't there. Something inside her dissolves and it feels like her world has just shifted on its axis.

"He's dead, Octavia," she states monotonously, stepping back without breaking her eyes' lock on Bellamy's cold face. "There's nothing we can do."

"_Clarke_," Octavia is crying again, but this time her tone of voice is desperate. "There's got to be something we can do. _Please_."

She isn't listening anymore; she can't. The silence of Bellamy's death is too loud for anything to move past the crushing sound that this loss releases. She doesn't answer Octavia's screams for her to get back there, and what is she doing, why won't she _say something_. Blood drips from her hands as Clarke stumbles off the ramp of the ship, past the fire pit and into her tent by herself.

The camp goes into chaos when word spreads. Blame is assigned, petty arguments spiral into full fledged fist fights, and fires burn in the hearts of mourning teenagers who had looked up to their only elder within camp. When they learn Bellamy is dead, all hell has broken loose, with no hopes to find control.

Clarke knew it would happen.

Octavia is broken; weeping, screaming, and shaking each night as the whispered nightmare of her brother's last breath haunts her. She blames herself. And she blames Clarke, too.

Clarke knew it would happen.

And she, herself, is silent.

Clarke had a feeling.

The teenagers are at a loss without their leaders; because it isn't just Bellamy they lost in the woods that day. She isn't the same, Clarke hears about herself. She's gone, but that doesn't make sense to her, because she's right here. Even when she desperately wishes she wasn't.

It's two months after Bellamy's death when she realizes she loves him.

Her fur blankets aren't enough to keep her warm at night. She tosses around under the skins and there is only one person she wishes to have wrapped around her, providing heat and comfort and love, and it's Bellamy.

But he's dead.

And she thinks that's when the breakdown starts, but to be honest, she isn't really all that sure. Sobs jerk her body this way and that, her ribs feel like they're falling in on themselves and she just wants to _talk _to him. She wants to hear him argue with her, mock her, agree with her, and treat her like the Princess he always called her. She just wants him around one last time, she swears it could be enough.

But it wouldn't be. She's greedy. She's had months to get over this; she planned a funeral, made speeches, buried his body. And it isn't enough. It'll never be enough. She loved him. _Loves _him. His death doesn't change that fact, and it's the most hopeless she's ever been when she finally understands this.

Because she will _never _stop loving Bellamy, and he will _never _get the chance to love her back.

Moonshine isn't enough to keep the images away. Some days she swears she can _feel _his blood wet on her hands. Whether it's a manifestation of her guilt or a trick of her corroded mind, she sees it. Dark red and ever present, she has killed the man she loves. And she was idiotically stubborn enough to ignore it until it was too late. Always too late.

Octavia isn't doing much better. Sometimes she visits, but Clarke knows the girl still names her the murderer. Because she is. And there's no way around it.

_If only_, Clarke finds herself thinking a great deal of the time. What if she'd allowed herself to love him? What if she'd admitted it to herself, and him? What if she'd remembered the _sheets_? What if she hadn't gone up to look for materials on the third floor?

What if she hadn't blinked?

The type of insanity that eats away at her is affecting everyone. She wakes in the night, screaming and thrashing with wet eyes and a guilty conscience. Jasper holds her down as Monty tries to calm her fit with words meant to soothe.

And while they may succeed in quieting her; preventing her from waking the others, the success is temporary. It will come again. Within the next few days or as soon as her head hits the pillow, no one knows. But the fix isn't permanent and it never will be. Because without Bellamy, there is nothing to keep her sane. There is no one else who can understand the horrors she's witnessed and the pressure she's under. There is only one, and he is no more.

Octavia meets with the grounder named Lincoln, the one she'd freed all those weeks ago, and he soothes her. He lessens her pain and helps her forget. Clarke figures love could do that. Love could mend other love's attack. She only wishes it was an option for herself.

But it's not. It never will be.

The camp is in ashes, boys and girls alike struggle for control. They all want the chance of leadership, they want to be followed, respected, responsible. Clarke wants to warn them of what she knows; what she has experienced and regretted, but she's found that she doesn't talk much anymore. She lets them fight it out, and fight it out, they do.

She misses him.

When she goes out on supply runs, when she gathers food, when grounder tribes threaten the "safety" of their crumbling camp, she longs for his knowledge and skill. When the fights break out, when the children are scared, when no one is _listening_, god dammit, she longs for his influence. When she is sleeping, when she is eating, when she is breathing she longs for _him_.

But he's gone. Her heart will never be satisfied, her life will never be completed, and her mind will never be quite sane; because Clarke's just as dead as he is.

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**Originally posted February 2nd, 2015 on my personal page on tumblr! Written for Rachel, who is an amazing person that I love very much. Special thanks to my beta, Sarah, who looked this over even though she's not even a part of this fandom! (thanks for putting up with my shit bby) and Mari (percyyoulittleshit) for offering help on the medical stuffs and stuffs, and Dan (son-of-rome) for sparking this little angst thing I tried to do. (sorry if i've failed you senpai)**


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